


the last great american dynasty

by annaregina



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy, Taylor Swift (Musician)
Genre: Angst, Based on a Taylor Swift Song, Beach House, Ben Han and Leia have died but it doesn't happen in fic, Canonical Character Death, Divorced Rey (previous), F/M, Grief/Mourning, Heartbreak, Loneliness, Married Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, Rey (Star Wars) Has Issues, Song Lyrics, Widow!Rey, the last great american dynasty
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-08
Updated: 2020-08-08
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:02:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25659424
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/annaregina/pseuds/annaregina
Summary: they say she was seen on occasion, pacing the rocks staring out at the midnight sea“Who lives there?” I ask one day as our daily walk takes us right to the edge of the rocky spit.My aunt turns up her nose and pulls me closer to her side. "No one important. Not anymore."
Relationships: Leia Organa/Han Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 22
Kudos: 37
Collections: Reylo Folklore Flash Fic, Reylo Hidden Gems





	the last great american dynasty

_Rebekah rode up on the afternoon train, it was sunny_  
_Her saltbox house on the coast took her mind off St. Louis_  
_Ben was the heir to the Skywalker Oil name, and money_  
_And the town said "How did a middle class divorcée do it?"_

“Who lives there?” I ask one day as our daily walk takes us right to the edge of the rocky spit. The sea crashes onto the shore full of reverence and entropy. One day the ocean will reclaim the rock, and the big white saltbox house along with it.

My aunt turns up her nose and pulls me closer to her side. I look over my shoulder at the bleak landscape, the house standing alone on the horizon. Her head is turned pointedly away from the path down the chalky cliffs towards Holiday House. “No one important. Not anymore.”

“Who?” I insist. The place feels magnetic, a world inside our own.

She sniffs. “It’s the old Skywalker house. But only Solo’s mad widow lives there now. That new money social climber, the nobody girl.”

“ _Painfully_ middle class,” she continues, unable to stop herself now the shameful secret is out, the words tumbling from her carefully drawn lips. “And divorced, too. Quite unsuitable for Benjamin – caused such a scandal. Forget her, dear, she’s batty now. Utterly lost it after his heart gave out. I really do think it was her fault, you know.”

I see her sometimes. She doesn’t come into town, but in the mornings there’s a slim figure winding her way through the rockpools and the mist; in the evenings she stands on the edge of the moor and lets her boots sink into the mud, dirtying the hems of her skirts that blow in the salty wind, staring at the midnight sea. Her fingers dance over the flowers and skip along every fence.

They say _‘there goes the maddest woman this town has ever seen’_. But I don’t see a mad woman.

I ask around a little more. Quietly, casually, when I pick up my new hat or while drinking tea from little cups after church.

(She is noticeably absent at every service, the Skywalker pew empty)

“Not sure what they expected when Leia married a scoundrel,” one woman says, her white lace gloves neatly pressed, fingers templed in her lap. “Her poor parents, their bloodlines dirtied like that. The boy seemed so sweet as a child, I thought he’d redeem the name - not sully it further.” The rouge on her pale cheeks makes for a stark contrast, a show of false vibrancy.

( _Her_ skin is tanned and freckled. I don’t think she’s ever inside the house – too many ghosts)

“Benjamin was a gentleman, despite his father,” another adds. It’s their favourite topic of discussion although they all think themselves far too well-to-do to be _caught_ gossiping. “Gosh, Benjamin's _temper_. She matched him in that, the one thing she could ever hope to match him in. He was the only one who could rein that little spitfire in.”

(Sometimes I hear her screaming at the spoondrift and spray. She yells different things under different moons, but most often it’s just three simple words: I ruined everything)

The ladies give me a knowing look over their china saucers. “The Skywalkers were the last great American dynasty. Who knows, if she’d never shown up what could’ve been.”

(She throws parties regularly. Her friends from the city come down and fill the pool with champagne. It’s loud and excessive and debauched. They bet and roll across the lawns and she lifts her skirts and dances shamelessly. It’s the only time you can hear laughter from the house and I watch from my window across the harbour)

On my next walk along the cliffs, lips crusted with salt, I see a man chasing a bright green dog, its tongue lolling joyfully. I laugh. He shakes his fist at me as the dog darts into the heather bushes, still painfully visible. I think she did it although I haven’t a clue why. I doubt God himself knows why.

(When I look over the cliffs, I see her pacing the rocks and talking to someone who doesn’t exist. I nearly climb down and join her, but I don’t)

From what I can tell, they were happy. Her and Benjamin. Despite her previous husband, despite her status, despite the inevitable guillotine blade of his family name and money and legacy. Despite _life_. And then Han died and the laughter faltered. The blade fell.

(Han Solo was the first, but not the last, commoner to marry into the Skywalker family. He was killed in the war.)

And then Leia died a week later, heartbroken, and it was just the two of them: his great laugh and sharp suits, her scandalous outfits and loose hair, his sad eyes and her weathered hands. The highs and lows of the family bundled into two bodies, their love burning brighter than the town cared for.

(I finally find out her name. Rebekah. Rey for short. It’s not very _Christian_ , is it, they tut. I like it. It suits her)

And then, and then, _and then_.

They lower their eyes when they tell me the next part, as if this, out of all the tragedy in the walls of Holiday House _this_ is what cuts them deepest.

Then Ben died. And it was just her.

(I don’t believe it was her fault, no matter what they say – no one’s heart ever failed from being too in love)

“There goes the last great American dynasty. Who knows, if she never showed up, what could’ve been.”

Rey walks across the hills for hours, talking to the fog. She spends her inherited money on ridiculous paintings and the ballet, her mind and interests running a mile a minute. She skips rocks on the beach and laughs at jokes Ben tells her in her head. I meet her on the spit one day and she tilts her head to the side and beams.

“They think you’re ruining everything,” I blurt out to this woman I have never spoken to before. I get the impression she’s used to being recognised.

She looks to her side, where Ben used to stand. I swear the air moves. “But aren’t I having a marvellous time?”

I don’t have an answer for her. And then she’s gone, the last of that great American dynasty.

_Fifty years is a long time,_  
_Holiday House sat quietly on that beach,_  
_Free of women with madness_  
_And men and their bad habits_  
_And then it was bought by me_

**Author's Note:**

> *screams in folklore* I love this song and now it hurts even more
> 
> Follow me on twitter!! [@astroemilyy](https://twitter.com/astroemilyy)


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